Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems have been used for many years for tracking assets, inventory, cargo and persons. In most applications, RFID is used to accurately locate the “tagged” item for inventory control or storage location. In the case of tracking personnel, the “tagged” item is a person that the user must locate in case of emergency or for the control of restricted areas or loitering. RFID systems map the location of each RFID tag, tying it to the location of the nearest reader. Such systems are used in hospitals to track and locate patients to make sure they are not in unauthorized areas, and such systems are also used in prisons for hand-free access control and prisoner location.
Similarly, video surveillance has been used extensively by commercial and industrial entities, the military, police, and government agencies for event detection purposes—such as security monitors in a shopping mall, a parking garage, or a correctional facility. Years ago, video surveillance involved simple closed circuit television images in an analog format in combination with the human monitoring thereof. Video surveillance has since progressed to the capture of images, the digitization of those images, the analysis of those images, and the prediction and the response to events in those images based on that analysis.